writing from start to finish: a six-step guide€¦ · writing from start to finish: a six-step...

WRITINGFROM START TO FINISHA SIX-STEP GUIDE

KATE GRENVILLE

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First published in 2001

Copyright © Kate Grenville 2001

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced ortransmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,including photocopying, recording or by any information storage andretrieval system, without prior permission from the publisher. TheAustralian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of onechapter or 10 per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to bephotographed by any educational institution for its educationalpurposes provided that the educational institution (or body thatadministers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright AgencyLimited (CAL) under the Act.

Allen & Unwin83 Alexander StreetCrows Nest NSW 2065AustraliaPhone: (61 2) 8425 0100Fax: (61 2) 9906 2218Email: [email protected]: www.allenandunwin.com

National Library of AustraliaCataloguing-in-Publication entry:

Grenville, Kate, 1950–.Writing from start to finish: a six-step guide.

Includes index.ISBN 1 86508 514 6.

1. Creative writing. 2. Essay—Authorship.3. English language—Rhetoric. I. Title.

808.042

Text design by Simon PatersonIllustrations by Fiona KatauskasSet in 10/15 pt Stempel Schneidler by Bookhouse, SydneyPrinted by Griffin Press, South Australia

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Some images in the original version of this book are not available for inclusion in the eBook.

CONTENTS

Introduction vWhat makes writing hard? vHow this book helps vCan anyone learn to write? viHow the six steps work vii

Writing assignments 1Understanding assignments 2Two kinds of writing assignments 3

Step One: Getting ideas 9About getting ideas 11Getting ideas for imaginative writing 14Getting ideas for an essay 28

Step Two: Choosing 47About choosing ideas 49Choosing ideas for imaginative writing 50Choosing ideas for an essay 57

Step Three: Outlining 67About making an outline 69Making an outline for imaginative writing 72Making an outline for an essay 86

Step Four: Drafting 103About writing a first draft 105First draft for imaginative writing 112First draft for an essay 122

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Step Five: Revising 135About revising 137Revising imaginative writing 140Revising an essay 153

Step Six: Editing 165About editing 167Editing imaginative writing 169Editing an essay 178

Other useful stuff 189Applying the six steps to different kinds of writing 189Types of texts at a glance 194User-friendly grammar 196Ten-minute exam kit 206

Bibliography 212

Acknowledgements 213

Index 214

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IntroductionWhat makes writing hard?

Writing sounds simple—you start with an attention-grabbing firstsentence, then you move on to some really interesting stuff in themiddle, and then you bring it all together at the end.

The trouble is, how do you think up that attention-grabbing firstsentence? Where do you go to find that really interesting stuff? Whatdo you do if your mind is as blank as the paper you’re staring at?

Sometimes writing happens the way it does in the movies. You sitdown, chew the end of the pen for a while, then you get inspired andsomething fantastic comes out. This is great when it happens, and if allyour writing’s like that, well, hey, you can stop reading now. You don’tneed this book.

This book is about what to do when you’ve chewed the pen downto the ink and you still haven’t got any ideas.

How this book helpsThis book is different from many other ‘how to write’ books becauseit reverses the usual order you do things in. Many books about writingsuggest you think out in advance what you’re going to write. Afteryou’ve thought out your piece, you write it.

This sounds logical and sensible. It works for some people all ofthe time. It works for some people some of the time. But it doesn’twork at all, ever, for many people, myself included.

Mainly, this is because of that little voice we’ve all got in our headthat says, ‘That’s no good, stupid!’. The trick to writing is to find a

Most peopledon’t findwriting easy.

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way of making that little voice shut up long enough for you to getsomething down on paper.

The way I suggest you approach writing is to start by letting yourmind roam around the topic in a free-form way. You make notes andwrite little bits and pieces, exploring many different ways into thetopic.

When you’ve got a good collection of these bits, you pick overthem for what you might be able to use, and you start to put them insome kind of order. As you do this, more ideas will come. Gradually,this evolves into your finished piece of writing.

The advantage of doing it this way is that you never have to makeideas appear out of thin air. Even if your bits and pieces aren’t brilliant,they are something—if only something to react against.

It also means that the process of creating and the process of judgingare separate. Once you’ve got something written, you can invite thatnasty little voice back in to evaluate what you’ve got and makechanges.

Instead of being caught up inside the machinery of your ownthinking, you can stand outside it, and see the process happening onestep at a time.

Can anyone learn to write?Experienced writers do a lot of these steps in their head, so fast theyoften aren’t even aware they’re doing them. It looks as if somethingintuitive and magic is happening—as if their brains are workingdifferently. I don’t think that is so—but I think they’re going throughthe steps so fast and so seamlessly, it looks like a leap rather than aplod. It’s like driving—experienced drivers shift gears without having tothink about it. Learner drivers, though, have to think consciously aboutit and practise gear shifting until it becomes automatic.

No one’s born knowing how to write—but it’s a skill that mostpeople can learn, and the more you do it, the easier it becomes.

I N T R O D U C T I O Nvi

Writingevolves, it

doesn’t justarrive.

Write first,judge later.

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How the six steps workThis book is based on the idea that you can use the same process forany kind of writing. Short stories, essays, reports—they all look verydifferent, and they’re doing different jobs, but you can go about themall in the same way using these same six steps:

1. Getting ideas (in no particular order).2. Choosing (selecting the ideas you think will be most useful).3. Outlining (putting these ideas into the best order—making a plan).4. Drafting (doing a first draft from beginning to end, without going

back).5. Revising (cutting, adding or moving parts of this draft where

necessary).6. Editing (proofreading for grammar, spelling and paragraphs).

I know these six steps work because I follow them every time I sitdown to write.

In the pages ahead, you’ll find a chapter for each step, containing:

7 information about the step—how to do it;

7 an example of the step—over the course of the book, theseexamples evolve into a completed short story and a completedessay;

7 a doing it section where you can apply what you’ve learned inthe chapter.

You can just look at the chapters you need at the moment. If you wantto learn how to write an essay, for example, you can read the ‘about’section, then skip ahead to the ‘example’ and ‘doing it’ sections foressay writing. Look for these icons in the bottom corner of the page.

viiH O W T H E S I X S T E P S W O R K

Remember:GoCookOneDreadfulRawEgg.

Writing getseasier withpractice.

You don’thave to readthrough thisbook frombeginning toend.

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At the end of the book there are a few other sections that shouldbe useful:

7 a summary of the different types of texts and theirrequirements;

7 a user-friendly guide to some of the most common grammarproblems;

7 a quick reference to the six steps for exam revision.

I N T R O D U C T I O Nviii

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Writing assignmentsThere seem to be so many different kinds of writing: novels,poems, short stories, scripts, letters, essays, reports, reviews,instructions . . . all quite different. But they’re all writing. They allhave the basic aim of getting ideas from one brain into another.

Any piece of writing will be trying to do at least one of thefollowing things:

7 Entertain—it doesn’t necessarily make the readers laugh, butit at least engages their feelings in some way.

7 Inform—it tells the reader about something.7 Persuade—it tries to convince the reader of something.

In the real world these purposes overlap. But a good place to startwriting is to ask: What is the basic thing I want this piece ofwriting to do?

Writing to entertainThink what it’s like to be a reader—you can be entertained(emotionally gripped) by something very serious, even sad, as wellas by something funny. An exciting plot can involve your emotions,too, by creating feelings of suspense. Writing that involves emotionscan also be reflective and contemplative.

Writing to entertain generally takes the form of so-called‘imaginative writing’ or ‘creative writing’ (of course, all writingrequires some imagination and creativity). Examples of imaginativewriting are novels, stories, poems, song lyrics, plays and screenplays.

Sometimes imaginative writing disguises itself as a ‘true story’for added effect. For example, The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole by SueTownsend disguises itself as a journal, while Dear Venny, Dear Saffron

Trying to putwriting incategories canmake you crazy,but it gets youthinking aboutwhat you’retrying to do.

For imaginativewriting you canmake things up.

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by Gary Crew and Libby Hathorn disguises itself as letters. Asreaders, though, we know that they’re not really journals orletters—these are just devices the writer has used to make thewriting more entertaining.

Writing to informThese kinds of writing can also be ‘entertaining’ in the sense thatthey’re a good read. But entertaining the reader isn’t their mainpurpose—that’s just a bonus.

Examples of writing to inform are newspaper articles, scientificor business reports, instructions or procedures, and essays for schooland university.

Writing to persuadeThis includes advertisements, some newspaper and magazinearticles, and some types of essay. This type of writing mightinclude your opinion, but as part of a logical case backed up withevidence, rather than just as an expression of your feelings.

I mentioned above that imaginative writing occasionally pretendsto be a true story, but if you’re writing to inform or persuade, youshouldn’t make things up.

Understanding assignmentsSometimes you’re free to write whatever you like, but at school oruniversity you’ll generally be given a specific writing assignment.This could be an imaginative writing assignment, an essay, or someother kind of writing task. Decoding the words of the assignmentso that you give your teacher or lecturer exactly what he or shewants is part of your job as a writer. There are two cluesembedded in every assignment that will help you crack the code:

7 the task word; and7 the limiting word.

W R I T I N G A S S I G N M E N T S2

Readingteachers’

minds: Whatdo they

really want?

If you’rewriting toinform orpersuade,

don’t makethings up!


Task wordsThe task word is usually the verb in the assignment—the wordthat tells you what to do. It might be something like: ‘discuss’;‘describe’; ‘write about’; or ‘compare’.

For example: Discuss the poem ‘Mending Wall’ by Robert Frost. Or:Write about your childhood.

Limiting wordsThe limiting word (or words) narrows the assignment in someway. For example: Discuss the use of imagery in the poem ‘MendingWall’ by Robert Frost.

Or: Write about the most embarrassing incident of your childhood.Sometimes, writing assignments have a sneaky hidden agenda.

They seem to be asking for an imaginative response, but they’realso looking for how much you know about a particular subject.

For example: Write a letter to the editor of a publishing company,recommending that the company publish the work of Robert Frost. Thehidden agenda is to show how much you know, in as much detailas possible, about Robert Frost’s poems. The ‘letter’ format is justfancy packaging for good old information and argument.

Two kinds of writing assignmentsIn this book, we’ll look in detail at two of the most common kindsof writing assignment:

7 imaginative writing assignments;7 essay assignments.

3T W O K I N D S O F W R I T I N G A S S I G N M E N T S


Imaginative writing assignmentsAssignments for imaginative writing commonly give you somethingthat acts as a trigger for your imagination. For example:

7 Look at this photograph and write a piece responding to it.7 Write a piece that begins with a young child waking, sitting

up in bed saying, ‘It’s my birthday! and promptly burstinginto tears.

7 Write a piece based on the theme ‘State of the Art’.

Others give you part of the story ready-made—the title, theopening or the end.

7 Use this as the title of a piece of writing: ‘The Very Worst’.7 Use this as the first sentence of a piece of writing: ‘The car

coughed, sputtered, choked and died’.

7 Use this as the final sentence of a piece of writing: ‘High upin the sky, a jet drew a long, soft line of vapour through theunclouded blue’.

Whatever form the assignment takes, it is asking you to write apiece that will ‘entertain’ your readers—that is, engage theirfeelings.

Essay assignmentsEssays generally ask you to do one of four things:

7 They might ask for straight information, arranged in somelogical order: an explanatory essay or report. For example:What are the themes of ‘Mending Wall’ by Robert Frost?

7 They might ask you to discuss different points of viewabout a subject: to present one side, then the other andfinally come down on one side. For example: Robert Frost’spoem ‘Mending Wall’ is his best poem. Discuss.


Theseassignments

invite you toshow whatyou know

about asubject.

Forinformation

about otherkinds ofwriting

assignments,see page 189.


7 They might ask you to argue for a particular point ofview—to make a case for one side of an argument. Forexample: Robert Frost’s poem ‘Mending Wall’ is his best poem.Do you agree or disagree? Give reasons for your answer.

7 Or they might ask you to compare or contrast severaldifferent things. For example: Robert Frost’s poem ‘MendingWall’ expresses the same themes as some of his other poems, but in

a different way. Discuss.

5T W O K I N D S O F W R I T I N G A S S I G N M E N T S


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Writing assignmentsTo show the process of writing from start to finish, I’m going to set myself

two writing assignments and work through them using the six steps.

Imaginative writing assignment

I’ve given myself this assignment:

Write a piece with the title ‘Steep Learning Curve’.

The task words here are ‘write a piece’. This is a very open-ended phrase

giving me a clue that I can approach the assignment in whatever way I

choose—it can be a poem or a play or a story.

The limiting words are ‘with the title “Steep Learning Curve” ’. This means

that what I write about has to have something to do with a steep learning

curve, but the exact kind of learning curve is up to me.

These clues suggest that the purpose of this piece will be to entertain. I’ll

work towards a piece of imaginative writing in the form of a short story.

Essay assignment

This is the assignment I’ve set myself:

‘Every story is a journey towards self-discovery.’ Using a novel you’veread this year as an example, show why you agree or disagree with thisstatement.

The task words here are ‘show why you agree or disagree’. This clue tells me

I should try to persuade the reader that I’m right in agreeing—or disagreeing—

with the statement.

The limiting words are ‘using a novel you’ve read this year as an example’.

This is a clue to write about just one book, and to use examples from it to

back up what I’m saying. In doing this, I’ll also be informing the reader of what

the book is about. I’ll work towards an essay of the kind required at school

and university.


Theseexamples

will developstep-by-stepthrough the

book.

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Writing assignmentsWhy am I writing this piece?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I being asked to write a piece that will entertain my reader(that is, keep them interested by getting their feelings involved, probably

by making things up)?

7 Am I being asked to write a piece that will inform my reader (that is,tell them facts about something in the real world)?

7 Am I being asked to write a piece that will persuade my reader (thatis, put forward an argument and convince them it’s the correct one)?

1

What’s the task of this assignment?

7 What is the task word in this assignment? (Am I being asked todiscuss, describe or compare, or something else?)

7 What is the limiting word or phrase? Is the assignment asking meto limit my piece to just one part of a larger subject?

7 Is there a hidden agenda in this assignment? (Is it presented as animaginative task, but also asks for information?)

2

What kind of writing should I do here?

7 Are there clues that tell me what form the writing should take (towrite the piece as an essay, as a short story, as a newspaper report)?

3

RecapNow that you know what the assignment

is asking you to do, you need ideas. How

do you get those ideas? The next chapter

is about several tried-and-true ways.

Hint . . . thinkabout thepurpose of thepiece.

Hint . . . lookat the verb inthe assignment.

Hint . . . someassignments letyou choose,others donÕt.

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STEP ONE

Getting ideas


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What’s in STEP ONEAbout getting ideas 11

What stops ideas? 12

Getting ideas for imaginative writing 14Making a list 14

Making a cluster diagram 14

Researching 15

Freewriting 16

Example: Getting ideas for imaginative writing 17

Doing it: Getting ideas for imaginative writing 22

Getting ideas for an essay 28Making a list 28

Making a cluster diagram 28

Researching 29

Freewriting 32

Example: Getting ideas for an essay 33

Doing it: Getting ideas for an essay 39


About getting ideas Ideas come from lots of places, but the one place they never,

ever come from is a sheet of blank paper. Blank paper willnever lead to anything better than more blank paper. That’swhy, if I had any rules for writing (which I don’t), my first and

last rule would be: Anything is better than a blank page.Getting ideas isn’t usually a matter of having one giant brainstorm.

More often, it’s a matter of gradually accumulating a little idea here,another little idea there. Eventually they all add up.

Here are four foolproof ways to get some words down on that blankpage:

7 making a list;7 making a cluster diagram;7 researching or independent investigation;7 freewriting.

11A B O U T G E T T I N G I D E A S

Even a dumbidea can leadto a betteridea.

They soundsimple andthey are—butthey work!

Making a list (or ‘brainstorming’ or ‘think-tanking’) is the best way Iknow to get started with a piece of writing. Your mind can flit around thetopic quickly. You don’t have to write a list in sentences, so you don’t getbogged down trying to think of the right words. You can just writeanything that comes to mind.

Making a cluster diagram is really just another kind of list, but one thatdevelops into little clusters of like-minded ideas. If yours is one of thosebrains that works best visually, a cluster diagram might be a user-friendlyway to start writing.

Researching or independent investigation means finding someinformation to use in your writing. The obvious place to do research is inbooks, but you can also do it on the Net, from videos and by gatheringyour own information first-hand (doing interviews, conductingexperiments, etc.).

Freewriting (or ‘speedwriting’ or ‘free-associating’) just means non-stoptalking onto the page. Because you can’t stop to think, your unconsciousgets to have a go.


S T E P O N E : G E T T I N G I D E A S12

What stops ideas?The Voice of Doom

The hardest thing about getting ideas is that little voice in yourhead that tells you all your ideas are no good. We all have thatvoice. I’ve been a professional writer for twenty years and I still getit every time I sit down to write.

I don’t think you can make that voice go away. If you wait forit to go away—if you wait until you feel happy with your ideas—you’ll wait a lifetime and never get anything done. The thing to dois to go on in spite of it. Speak firmly to it. ‘Okay,’ you can say: ‘It’sno good. I won’t argue about that. But I’ll just keep going anyway.Laugh all you want.’

‘Inspiration’

You can’t force ideas. The best ones often come when you’re nottrying to control your brain too much. They often feel as if theyhave come out of nowhere.

They haven’t really come from nowhere, though—they’ve comeout of your brain—but out of the unconscious part. The unconsciousis like the hidden two-thirds of an iceberg—it supports everythingelse, but you can’t see it.

What happens when you get an ‘inspiration’ is just that theconscious, thinking part of your brain has switched off for aminute, and the unconscious has switched on. The unconscious is awriter’s best friend.

The unconscious goes on strike if you try to tell it what to door if you criticise it. This means to get ideas you have to let yourmind roam wherever it wants to. Once your unconsciousness hasgiven you some ideas, your conscious mind can take over again.

Premature planning

It’s true that when you start to write a piece, you should have aplan. But getting ideas isn’t the same as writing a piece. There’s a time

The Voice ofDoom is a

bully—don’tlet it win!

‘Inspiration’works the

same way formaths and

science as itdoes forwriting.

Planning toosoon can shut

the door onnew ideas.


13A B O U T G E T T I N G I D E A S

to think and plan (in this book, that time is during Step Three), anda time to let your mind wander freely, gathering all kinds of ideas.

Writer’s block

There’s a lot of melodrama around the idea of writer’s block, butit’s not a terminal illness. It just means that you’ve come to the endof one path of ideas. That’s okay—you go off on another one.Instead of trying to force a path through the wall, you go around it.

One thing that helps is to remind yourself that no one else isgoing to read any of this. Step One is your own private notesto yourself—like an artist’s rough sketches. It also helps to remindyourself that everything goes through a stage where it lookshopeless. Making toffee, learning to rollerblade, painting yourbedroom—there’s always a moment when that little voice says,‘This is never going to work’. But just on the other side of thatmoment is the breakthrough.

It also helps to remember that you have had ideas in the past.This suggests you might have more in the future. Think about agood idea you’ve had in the past—not necessarily about writing.How did you get the idea for that Mother’s Day present your mumliked so much? How did the idea for the Self-Adjusting ShoelaceDoer-Upper come to you? Is there a state of mind, or a set ofcircumstances that makes it easier for you to think of good ideas?

Thinking that you have to write a masterpiece is a sure way toget writer’s block. None of the things we’ll do in Step One willlook like a masterpiece. Don’t let that worry you. This isn’t thestep where we write the masterpiece. This is the step where wethink up a whole lot of ideas. Writing the masterpiece comes later.

The next section is about getting ideas for imaginative writing.

If you’re looking for help with an essay, skip ahead to page 28.

‘Writer’sblock’ is anormal partof writing.

Beware ofthe pressureto write amasterpiece!



Getting ideas for imaginative writing The aim of a piece of imaginative writing is to entertain

the reader, so that means I’ll be trying to think ofentertaining ideas.

That’s a big ask. Very few people can think ofentertaining ideas straight off. So—I’ll work up to it. I’ll start

by asking my brain to think up any old ideas. One idea leads toanother and sooner or later they’ll get more entertaining. As Imentioned on page 11, there are at least four good ways to comeup with ‘any old ideas’.

Making a listA list is the easiest, least threatening way to start writing. Start byworking out what is the single most important word or phrase inthe assignment. This is the key word. Write that at the top of ablank page and list anything that comes into your head about it.

Making a cluster diagramAnother way of making a list is to do it in the form of a clusterdiagram.

Instead of having the assignment at the top of the page, youwrite the key word from the assignment in the middle of the page.You put down ideas as they come to you, and if they connect toan idea you’ve already put down, you group them together. Theaim is to form clusters of linked ideas.

The act of clustering ideas often seems to make it easier forthem to flow. Also, your ideas can jump from cluster to cluster,adding a bit here, a bit there.

Writing isn’teasy—so start

with somethingsimple.

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ResearchingAnother name for research is independent investigation becausewhat it means is going and finding out something about the subjectyourself. There are two reasons to do research for a piece ofcreative writing:

7 as a way of finding ideas;7 as a way of finding interesting details to develop ideas

you already have.

A lot of imaginative writing gets done without any research at all.But research can make a dull story come to life—it can add vividdetails and make it more believable.

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Research for imaginative writing can be about a location (JohnMarsden, for example, drew on real places and stories for Tomorrow,When the War Began). It can be about a historical period (ColleenMcCullough does a lot of historical research for her books aboutancient Rome). Or it can delve into technical information (such asin Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park).

Research might also take the form of direct personalinvestigation—asking your grandmother what life was like whenshe was a child, for example, or gathering information about yourfamily tree.

Writers often keep a notebook for their research—if you see anodd-shaped cloud or overhear something peculiar on the bus, youput in it your notebook. Later, when you’re writing, you can gothrough the notebook and see if that cloud or that overheardcomment can go in your story. In all these cases, the writer ismaking use of the fact that truth is often stranger than fiction (andmore interesting, too).

FreewritingFreewriting is just thinking on paper. It’s a good way to let theunconscious give you ideas because it lets you access your memory,your experiences, your knowledge, your fantasies . . . things youdidn’t even know you had stored away in your head.

The idea is to switch the brain off while keeping the penmoving across the paper. It’s important not to plan what you’rewriting, or the ideas will stop flowing. It’s also important not tostop and think. For freewriting the whole idea is not to think.

I know that it’s hard to stop the brain thinking and planning,because we’ve all been taught to do that. However, switching thethinking-and-planning brain off for a while is also something youcan learn, and like other things it gets easier with practice. (Anddon’t worry, you’ll switch it on again in Step Two.)

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Carry anotebook withyou and write

things downstraight away.

A few wordswill do.


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Getting ideas for imaginative writingMaking a list

To remind you, the imaginative writing assignment I’ve given myself is:

Write a piece with the title ‘Steep Learning Curve’.

The most important word here seems to be ‘learning’, so I’ll begin with

that and start listing everything that comes into my mind about ‘learning’—

any kind of learning. Here’s what comes out.

Learning to readLearning to tell the timeLearning to swim***The Olympic PoolBlue waterLittle white hexagonal tilesDad holding me under the chestDon’t let go, don’t let goFunny echoing noisesFeeling of water up nose***

Learning tennisHitting balls over fenceHuge swing, then missJeff Jackson laughing at me***Learning FrenchLearning lists of words by heartEmbarrassing trying to say thewords out loudOther kids seemed to be gettingit okayMe the only dummie

There’s nothing brilliant here, but I’ve got examples of three different

kinds of learning: learning to swim, learning tennis, and learning French.

That means I’ve got three ideas about the assignment now, where two

minutes ago I had a blank sheet of paper.

BrainÕs stopped!

Another deadend

CanÕt think ofanything else

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Making a cluster diagram

I start with the key word in the middle of a page:

LEARNING

To get myself going I use a few ideas from my first list. As I do this, new

ideas start coming.

Messy, isn’t it? Making a cluster diagram is one time when it’s good to

be messy. It means the ideas are flowing.

Teacher’s big clear writing

Flashcards in kindy

‘Kooka’ on the oven door

Learning to read

Learning to swim

Failing tests

Ran over dog

Panicked

Cheating from Caroline B

Learning to driveLearning French

Quiet back lanesuddenly full of cars

Miss M trying to look French

Jerky starts

Singing ‘Frère Jacques’

Driving test

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19

A rat will not normally respondto the turning-on of a light. Itdoes, however, respond to anelectric shock applied to its feet.It responds in a great many ways:by squealing, jumping, gnawing,urinating, defecating, changingrespiration rate and heart rate andso on. If a light is turned on justbefore the application of a shockto the rat, the light alone, after anumber of pairings, will elicitsome of the responses.

Researching

First, I’ll use research to find some ideas.

In a psychology book I look through the index for the word ‘learning’

and come to an entry called ‘Conditioned learning’. I skim through until

this bit catches my eye:

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Because I was thinking about French classes while I was writing my

list back on page 17, I’ve got a fellow feeling for those rats. No one gave

us electric shocks in French classes, but sometimes it felt like that.

I’ll make a note about it:

Learning French as bad as electric shocks.Learned to dread Wednesdays and Fridays—French days.Tried to be invisible, avoid teacher’s eye.

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Second, I’ll use research to develop some ideas I already have.

I could research ‘learning to swim’ (perhaps by going to a swimming

pool and watching kids learning to swim). I could research ‘learning tennis’

(perhaps by watching some kids learning tennis). As it happens, my old

French textbook is close at hand, so I’ll use that to research ‘learning

French’. Was it really as hard to learn as it had seemed back when I was

thirteen? When I get to this bit, I decide it was:

All French nouns (persons orthings) are considered eithermasculine or feminine, thenoun markers le and la (oftenreferred to as definite articles)indicating the category in adistinction usually known asgender, while the plural ofboth le and la is les.

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21E X A M P L E : G E T T I N G I D E A S F O R I M AG I N AT I V E W R I T I N G

Freewriting

I write the words ‘Steep Learning Curve’ at the top of a sheet of paper,

set a timer for three minutes, and start writing. Here’s what comes out:

Learning—hard and embarrassing, you can’t do it, you feelstupid. Worse with people who already know how to do it. Nowwhat? I can’t think of anything else to write. I don’t thinkthis is working French was the worst, it didn’t make sense.Maison meant house, I could learn that, a bit like mansion.But what about the ‘le’ and ‘la’ business? How were yousupposed to remember that—two different words for ‘the’?Why? Why some ‘feminine’ and some ‘masculine’? I asked MissM—Why is ‘leg’ feminine and ‘foot’ masculine. She gave methat ‘what a dummie’ look. The whole class staring at me. NowI’ve run out of things to I cheated. Copied from Caroline Bnext to me. She tried to stop me—sloped her page away andhid it behind her hand. Maybe I really wanted to be foundcheating, so someone would rescue me.

I didn’t consciously decide to freewrite about French—but it was in my

mind from doing the research, so that’s what came out.

Suddenlythought ofsomething

else.

Rememberedsomething I

hadnÕtthought offor years.

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Getting ideas for imaginative writingM A K I N G A L I S T

Hint . . . look fora task word

(see page 3).

Hint . . . look for alimiting word(see page 3).

Relax . . . Startinga piece of writing

is hard foreveryone.

Write the assignment at the top of a page

7 If you’ve been given an imaginative writing topic by a teacher, you canuse that. Otherwise, just to practise, use one of those on page 4.

1

Work out what the assignment wants you to do

Ask yourself:

7 What’s the exact task I’m being asked to do?

2

Start making a list

7 Find what you think is the most important word or phrase in theassignment and make it the first item in your list.

7 Scribble down anything that comes into your head about that wordor phrase.

7 Use a new line for each thought.7 Write just a word or two for each thought.

3

Can’t do it?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I rejecting the ideas before I even write them down?(Solution: don’t think, just write.)

7 Am I letting the Voice of Doom bully me into stopping?(Solution: tell it you know perfectly well these ideas are rubbish, thanks

all the same.)

7 Am I worrying that these ideas won’t work for my piece?(Solution: don’t think about writing a piece, just think about writing a list.)

7 Am I worrying that I’m spelling the words wrongly?(Solution: spell them any way you like at this stage.)

7 Am I weird because I’m finding this hard?(Solution: no, you’re like everyone else on the planet.)

4

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23D O I N G I T : G E T T I N G I D E A S F O R I M AG I N AT I V E W R I T I N G

MAKING A CLUSTER DIAGRAM

Hint . . . just putdown the firstthing that comesinto your head.

When your list fills the page, you can stop and read it over

If this list doesn’t look like enough, don’t panic. There are lots of other ways

to get ideas—keep reading for some more.

5

Find the key word or words

7 Make a box in the middle of the page and write the key word (themost important word) of the assignment in it.

7 Take your time making it look nice, because while you’re busy doingthat, part of your brain is actually thinking about the assignment.

1

Draw a line out from the box

Ask yourself:

7 What does this make me think of?

2

Write that thought down

7 Wrap it in a little idea bubble.7 Attach it to the box the key word is in.

3

Keep asking questions about the key word

Ask yourself:

7 Does it make me remember something that once happened to me?7 Does it make me think of another word?7 Does it make me think of its opposite?7 Does it make me think of something that seems to have nothing to

do with the topic?

7 Does it make me think of a particular person, or place, or incident?

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Hint . . . no matterwhat you think of

it, write it downanyway.

Hint . . . a messycluster diagram

is a good clusterdiagram.

Ask questions about the idea bubbles, too

Ask yourself:

7 Does this make me remember something else?7 Does this make me wonder about something, or start to imagine or

make up something?

5

Getting stuck?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I pre-judging my ideas?(Solution: don’t judge them till later.)

7 Am I worrying that I’m going off into irrelevant ideas?(Solution: worry later about whether they’re relevant.)

7 Am I getting bogged down repeating myself?(Solution: go back to the key word, or to one of the bubbles, and start

again.)

7 Is my diagram all lopsided?(Solution: relax—lopsided is fine for a cluster diagram.)

6

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RESEARCHING

Choose something from your list to find moreinformation about

Ask yourself:

7 Is there a person, a place or an event that I can find out more about?7 Is there a general idea or concept that I can fill in with specific details?

1

Hint . . .researchingÕs likefishingÑthebigger your net,the more fishyouÕll catch.

Start looking for information

Ask yourself:

7 Is there a reference book I can look up (a dictionary, encyclopedia,atlas…)?

7 Is there a book about the subject (either non-fiction or fiction)?7 Can I find sites about this on the Net?7 Is there a film or video about this?

2

Decide whether to research personally

Ask yourself:

7 Is there someone I can interview about this (either an individual or agroup)?

7 Can I investigate it by observing it myself (going and having a goodlook at what I’m researching)?

7 Can I investigate it by experiencing it directly (doing it myself)?

3

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How to tell when you’ve found something useful

Ask yourself:

7 Did I think ‘Wow, that’s really funny/weird/revolting/incredible’?7 Did I find something sticking in my mind, even something I don’t think

is ‘relevant’?

7 Did I find some specific examples of something I’ve been thinking aboutin general terms? (For example, if you were thinking about ‘flowers’

and now you’ve got ‘daisies, roses, flannel flowers, lilies…’)

7 Did I find details about a person or a place?7 Did I hear a way of speaking or some other sound?7 Can I understand how something feels from the inside now that I’ve

tried doing it?

4

Hint . . . if you findit interesting,

chances are thatyour readers

will, too.

Hint . . . donÕt letthe Voice of

Doom talk youout of it.

Make a quick note of what you find and where it’slocated

For more on note-taking, see page 30.

5

What if you can’t find anything?

7 Leave it and go on to the next way of gathering ideas. Later, when thepiece is further advanced, you might see what you need to research.

6

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FREEWRITING

Get some kind of timer and set it for five minutes

7 This is so you don’t have to keep checking how many minutes you’vedone.

1

Write the main words of the topic at the top of the page

7 Keep writing without stopping.7 If you can’t think of anything else to write and you want to stop, don’t.

2

What if I really can’t keep going?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I trying to plan in advance what I’ll say? (Solution: let each word suggest the next one—just go forward one word

at a time.)

7 Am I worried about writing something silly?(Solution: write something really silly. Then you can stop worrying about it.)

7 Do I keep wanting to stop and read what I’ve written?(Solution: promise yourself you can do that, but not till the timer goes off.)

7 Am I going round in circles saying the same thing over and over?(Solution: take a fresh page and give yourself a run-up with one of these

writing starters:

‘One day, I . . .’ ‘The thing about [key word] is . . .’

‘One incident I remember about [key word] is . . .’

‘The best/worst [key word] memory I have is . . .’)

3

Relax . . .the GreatWriting isnÕtsupposed tohappen tillStep Six.Think automatic writing

It’s a Zen kind of thing—just let whatever comes, come.

The next section is about getting ideas for an essay. If you want to go on

with imaginative writing, skip ahead to Step Two (page 47).

4

Hint . . . keep thepen movingacross thepaper, no matterwhat comes out.

Try ‘I can’tthink ofanything towrite. This isthe silliestthing I’ve everdone’, etc.Eventually yourbrain will comeup withsomething else.

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Getting ideas for an essayFor an essay, your aim is to persuade or inform your

readers about the topic, so you want to end up with ideasthat will persuade or inform.

Where do you start? Should you find out about thetopic by doing research first? But how do you know what

you need to research? Like so much of writing, it’s a chicken-and-egg sort of thing.

The thing is not to worry about whether you’ve got a chickenor an egg. You need both and it doesn’t matter which you startwith. The place to start is to put down everything you alreadyknow or think about the topic. Once you get that in a line, you’llsee where to go next.

Don’t worry yet about your theme or your structure. You’re notwriting an essay yet—you’re just exploring. The more you explore,the more ideas you’ll get, and the more ideas you have, the betteryour essay will be.

Making a listWriting an essay takes several different kinds of skills, but the firstone is easy. We can all write a list. Start the list by writing downthe most important word or phrase (the key word) from theassignment, then putting down every thought that comes to youabout it.

Making a cluster diagramA cluster diagram is really just another kind of list, but instead oflisting straight down the page, you list in clusters around a keyword. Think of the spokes of a wheel radiating out from the hub.

Something about the physical layout of a cluster diagram oftenmakes it easier for ideas to start flowing. You can jump aroundfrom cluster to cluster, adding a thought here and a thought there.

It doesn’tmatter where

you start, aslong as you get

something onpaper.

A clusterdiagram is also

known asbrainstorming

or an ideatree.

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29

ResearchingWhen you write an essay, you’re usually expected to find out whatother people have already thought about the subject. Your ownideas are important too, but they should be built on a foundationof what’s gone before. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel.

Since most essays rely on this kind of foundation, you need toknow how to do it properly. I’ll take a moment here to talk abouthow to research (otherwise known as independent investigation).

Research is about getting some hard information on yoursubject: actual facts, actual figures. The sad thing about research isthat usually only a small percentage of it ends up in your finaldraft. But like the hidden nine-tenths of an iceberg, it’s got to bethere to hold up the bit you can see.

You often research several times during the writing process. Thefirst time you mightn’t know exactly what you’ll be writing about,so research will be fairly broad-based. As the essay starts to takeshape, you’ll have narrowed the topic down. At that stage youmight research again to find specific details.

How do you research?

First you have to find your source of information. You might look at books, journals, videos, newspapers, on the

Internet, on CD-ROM. You go to reference books like dictionariesand encyclopedias.

You might also do your own research: interviewing people,conducting an experiment, doing a survey. In the case of my topic,reading the novels themselves is research (the novels are ‘primarysources’), and so is finding anything that critics or reviewers mighthave said about them (these are ‘secondary sources’).

G E T T I N G I D E A S F O R A N E S S AY

Research—youneed it, evenif it ends upbetween thelines, not onthem.

Research isonly astrustworthy asits source.

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A word about acknowledgement

Because you’re piggy-backing on other people’s work, you have tolet your reader know that—to give credit where credit is due. Youcan do this either in the text of the essay, in footnotes or in a listof sources at the end.

Once you’ve found your source, you can’t just lift slabs of it andplonk them into your essay. You have to transform the informationby putting it into your own words and shaping it for your ownpurposes. An essential first step in this process is taking notes. Ifyou can summarise a piece of information in a short note, it meansyou’ve understood it and made it your own. Later, when you writeit out in a sentence, it will be your own sentence, organised foryour own purposes.

How to take notes

7 Before you start taking notes, put a heading that tells youexactly what the source is. This means you can find it againquickly if you need to and you can acknowledge it. In thecase of a book, you should note the name of the author, thetitle of the book, the date and place of publication, and thepage or chapter number. The call number (the library numberon the spine) is also useful. (It’s tempting to skip this step,and I often have. The price is high, though—frustrating hoursspent flipping through half-a-dozen books looking for oneparticular paragraph so you can acknowledge the source ofyour information or find some more detail.)

7 Use the table of contents and the index to go straight to therelevant parts.

7 Skim-read to save time once you’ve got to the relevant parts.7 Write down the main words of the idea with just enough

connecting words for your note to make sense.

Moreinformation on

how toacknowledge

other people’swork can be

found onpage 184.

Note-taking isabout

thinking, notjust copying.

Research isonly useful ifyou can saywhere you

found it.

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31

7 Put only one point per line.7 Sometimes turning the information into a diagram is the best

way to make notes.

7 Put your notes under headings so you can see theinformation in bundles. Often, the research is alreadyorganised under headings: you can just copy those.

7 If you can’t see how to reduce a big lump of research to afew snappy lines, try the ‘MDE’ trick: find its Main idea,then its Details, then any Examples.

7 Develop a shorthand that works for you—shorten words (forexample, char. for character), use graphics (for example,sideways arrows to show cause and effect, up and downarrows to show things increasing or decreasing).

The cheat’s note-taking

People often ‘take notes’ by highlighting or underlining the relevantparts of a book or article. This is certainly easier than making yourown notes, but it’s not nearly as useful. The moment when youwork out how to summarise an idea in your own words is themoment when that idea becomes yours. Just running a highlighteracross someone else’s wordsdoesn’t do that—the ideastays in their words, in theirbrain. It hasn’t been digestedby you.

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A bad idea: itruins thebook for thenext person.

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FreewritingFreewriting is just a fancy word for talking onto the page—a wayof thinking aloud about the topic in an unstructured way. It’s likethe ‘free association’ exercises that psychologists use: it’s just non-stop writing.

The reason freewriting works is that you can let your brain offthe leash for a while and send it out to find ideas. Ideas are shylittle things and they won’t come if you try to bully them, or ifyou keep criticising them. The important thing with freewriting isnot to stop and think. Just keep the ideas flowing out the end ofyour pen onto the page.

It’s true that your essay needs to be thought-out and planned,and it will be. But this isn’t the essay—this is just another way ofgetting ideas for the essay. There’s a time to question whether theseideas are useful. But that time isn’t now. Now is the time to invitein any ideas that may happen by.

Freewriting letsyou find

thoughts younever knew

you had.

Creativitymeans beingprepared totake a risk.

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33E X A M P L E : G E T T I N G I D E A S F O R A N E S S AY

Getting ideas for an essayMaking a list

The assignment I’ve given myself is:

‘Every story is a journey towards self-discovery.’ Using a novelyou’ve read this year as an example, show why you agree ordisagree with this statement.

There seem to be several key words in this assignment: one is ‘a novel

you’ve read this year’ and the other is ‘self-discovery’. I’ll take them one

at a time.

I’ll start by listing what I can think of about novels ‘I’ve read this year’,

then list what I can think of about ‘self-discovery’.

‘A novel I’ve read this year’What have I read?Tomorrow, When the War BeganLooking for AlibrandiHuckleberry FinnThe Day of the Triffids

‘Self-discovery’What exactly is self-discovery?How define?Discovering you can do something?Learning how to do something?Learning from mistakes?Learning about your own character?

While I was doing it, this list seemed like rubbish. But now that I look at

what I’ve written, I can see that it tells me two things I could do next:

7 I could find out more about what ‘self-discovery’ means.7 I could go back to the novels I’ve listed and see if there’s ‘self-

discovery’ in any of them.

A big, vague, woolly problem has turned into two quite specific smaller

problems, and I can see where to go next.

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Making a cluster diagram

In the middle I put the key word of my assignment. To get myself going,

I’ll start with a few ideas from my list. As I do this, new ideas start coming.

Implies you didn’t know before

Things you thinkyou can’t do

Needs things to go wrong

Needs a crisis?Learning about yourself

Discover good things

Might notwant to know Kind, wise, brave . . .

mature

Discover bad things

SELF-DISCOVERY

SelfishCowardly

Hurt others

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Researching

I’m going to investigate this topic by looking at four sources of information.

Research source 1: Macquarie Dictionary (1st edn), page 523

‘Self-discovery’ isn’t in this dictionary, but ‘discovery’ and ‘discover’ are:

Discover: To get knowledge of,learn of, or find out; gain sightor knowledge of somethingpreviously unseen or unknown.

Research source 2: Tomorrow, When the War Began byJohn Marsden

From the list of novels I’ve read this year, I choose Tomorrow, When the

War Began by John Marsden. It’s a book that shows a group of characters

under pressure, and I think some of them probably go through ‘self-

discovery’. I read the book again with ‘self-discovery’ in mind and make

notes about the self-discovery of the main character, Ellie. I note the page

numbers so that I can easily find them again—that way, I can actually use

quotes from the book when I write the essay.

page 69—Ellie explodes mower—learns about defending herself82—steps into light—learns she can be brave95—thinks about having killed 3 people161—thinks she’s a monster161—doesn’t want to be ‘town slut’164—surprised that she recovers from guilt of killing184—confused—likes both Homer and Lee194—realises with Homer the attraction is only physical

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Research source 3: Information about the novel

I look up a library catalogue under ‘adolescent fiction’ and find a book

that has a chapter about John Marsden’s work: The Adolescent Novel:

Australian Perspectives by Maureen Nimon and John Foster, Centre for

Information Studies, Wagga Wagga, 1997. There’s a sentence or two that

seem relevant to my topic.

. . .by the end of the second volume,Robyn becomes aware of a fact that thereader would have noticed already: thatshe and her friends have actually gainedsomething by their involvement in thewar . . . the characters realise how theyhave matured and developed. . .(page 177)

Rather than take notes here, I photocopy the extract because I might want

to use it word-for-word as a quote in my essay.

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Research source 4: Background information about the book

I go to John Marsden’s website: www.ozemail.com.au/~andrewf/john.html

A Word from John Marsden

Lots of people have asked where the ideas for

the series originated. Of course with any book

there are many elements. For me, my father’s

stories about World War II were pretty

powerful. He fought in the Middle East, Borneo

and New Guinea, and was shot in the leg. I was

also impressed by the attacks on Australia by

the Japanese Navy and Air Force. Most people

have forgotten already but Darwin was heavily

bombed for a long period in 1942 and Japanese

submarines, manned by brave sailors, got into

Sydney Harbour, causing devastation and

substantial loss of life. It seems to me that

in the nineties Australians have become a bit

too complacent, and no-one is seriously

concerned about our security.

Another spur for writing the books was

watching an Anzac Day Parade and wondering how

today’s teenagers would react if they were

placed in the same position as their

grandparents and great-grandparents in the two

world wars. So many people see today’s

teenagers as drug-and-alcohol crazed graffiti

vandals, but I was fairly sure that given a

challenge the teenagers of the nineties would

show as much courage and maturity as their

predecessors.

Again, I might use parts of this as a quote in my essay, so I’ve printed the

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Freewriting

I start by quoting the topic, to give myself a run-up. Then I just keep

burbling on.

‘Every story is a journey towards self-discovery’—is this true?Every story seems like a big claim—does Red Riding Hood cometo self-discovery? Or Cinderella? Not sure. Don’t know. . .yes, inTomorrow, When the War Began. Ellie discovers she’s tough. Sotough she kills people. What else, what else, what else? Alsodiscovers feelings she didn’t know she had—for Lee & Homer.Discovers she’s confused about her feelings—she’s keen on bothLee & Homer & doesn’t want them to know. What else?Something about the way she feels about her parents. The rolesare reversed, she has to look after them now. Feels responsiblefor them. Maybe that’s another sort of self-discovery—sense ofobligation. Obligation not coming from what her parents tell herto do but from within herself. First chapter—all the kids haveto talk their parents into letting them go camping. Whereaslater on they have to make their own decisions about what’sright & wrong. Is that all? That seems to be all. I can’t thinkof anything. What about the other characters in the book as wellas the narrator? Does Homer go through self-discovery? Or didhe always know he was a leader type—it’s just that no one elseknew it. Not sure about the other characters. Stick to Ellie.

From having no ideas, I’ve now got pages of them. Nothing earth-shattering

maybe, but better than a blank page.

nearlystopped,

made myselfkeep writing

just keepthat penmoving

slowed down,nearly gave

up

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39D O I N G I T : G E T T I N G I D E A S F O R A N E S S AY

Getting ideas for an essayMAKING A L IST

Write the assignment at the top of a page

7 If you’ve got an essay assignment you can use that. Or you can usemy assignment. Or, you can adapt some of the assignments on pages 4–5

by inserting the title of a book or poem you’ve studied.

1

Work out what the assignment wants you to do

Ask yourself:

7 What’s the basic subject area of this assignment?7 What’s the exact task I’m being asked to do?

2 Hint . . . look forthe key word/sin theassignment.

Hint . . . look forthe taskword/s andthe limitingword/s.

Start making a list

7 Write the key word as the first item on the list.7 List anything that comes into your head about that word.7 Use a new line for each idea.7 Write just a word or two for each idea.7 If there is more than one key word, list all you can about the first,

then repeat the process for the second.

3

Can’t do it?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I rejecting the ideas before I even write them down? (Solution: don’t think, just write.)

7 Am I letting the Voice of Doom bully me into stopping?(Solution: don’t try to argue with it—go on writing anyway.)

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7 Am I worrying that these ideas won’t work for my piece?(Solution: don’t think about writing an essay, just think about writing a

list.)

7 Am I worrying that my ideas aren’t on the topic?(Solution: worry later about that. The essay has to be on the topic, but

this list doesn’t.)

7 Am I worrying that I’m spelling the words wrongly or not using theright ones?

(Solution: use any words you like and spell them any way you like at

this stage.)

7 Am I weird because I’m finding this hard?(Solution: no, you’re like everyone else on the planet.)

When your list fills the page, you can stop and read itover

If this list doesn’t look like enough, don’t panic. There are lots of other

ways to get ideas.

5

Relax . . . startinga piece of writing

is hard foreveryone.

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MAKING A CLUSTER DIAGRAM

Make a box in the middle of the page and write the keyword of the assignment in it

7 Take your time making it look nice because while you’re busy doingthat, part of your brain is actually thinking about the assignment.

1

Draw a line out from the box

Ask yourself:

7 What does this make me think of?

2

Write that thought down

7 Wrap it in a little idea bubble.7 Attach it to the box the key word is in.

3

Keep asking questions about the key word

7 Does it make me remember something I’ve read or learned about thissubject?

7 Does it make me remember something that once happened to me?7 Does it make me think of another word?7 Does it make me think of its opposite?7 Does it make me think of something that seems to have nothing to

do with the topic?

4

Hint . . . just putdown the firstthing that comesinto your head.

Hint . . . write itdown anywayÑitmight turn outto be useful.

Hint . . . a messycluster diagramis a good clusterdiagram.

Ask questions about the idea bubbles, too

7 Does this make me remember something else?7 Can I extend this idea one step further? Then another step?

5

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Getting stuck?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I pre-judging my ideas?(Solution: leave the judging of them till later.)

7 Am I worrying that I’m going off into irrelevant ideas?(Solution: worry later about whether they’re relevant.)

7 Am I getting bogged down repeating myself?(Solution: go back to the key word, or to one of the bubbles, and start

again.)

7 Is my diagram all lopsided?

6

Relax . . . lopsidedis fine for a

cluster diagram.

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RESEARCHING

Hint . . .researching islike fishingÑthebigger your net,the more fishyouÕll catch.

Choose something from your list to find moreinformation about

Ask yourself:

7 Is there a person, place or an event that I can find out more about?7 Is there a general idea or concept that I can fill in with specific details?

1

Start looking for more information

Ask yourself:

7 Is there a reference book I can look up (a dictionary, encyclopedia,atlas…)?

7 Is there a book about the subject (either non-fiction or fiction)?7 Can I find sites about this on the Net?7 Is there a film or video about this?

2

Decide whether to research personally

Ask yourself:

7 Is there someone I can interview about this (either an individual or agroup)?

7 Can I investigate it by observing it myself (going and having a goodlook at what I’m researching)?

7 Can I investigate it by experiencing it directly (doing it myself)?

3

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How to tell when you’ve found something useful

Ask yourself:

7 Did I find something directly useful—something that relates directly tothe key word in the topic—a date, a fact, an idea?

7 Did I find something that doesn’t seem directly useful, but it sticks inmy mind?

7 Did I find some specific examples of something I’ve been thinking aboutin general terms? (For example, you were thinking about ‘self-discovery’

in a general way and now you have particular kinds of self-discovery

and specific examples of it.)

7 Did I read something that someone else has said about the subjectthat I could use as a direct quote?

7 Did I experience or observe something that gives me a differentperspective or insight?

4

Hint . . . donÕt letthe Voice of

Doom talk youout of it. Write

it down.

Make a quick note of what you find, and where it’slocated

More info on note-taking can be found on page 30.

5

Hint . . . in theessay, you maynot be able to

use the personalexperience

itself, but youcan use theinsight that

came out of it.

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FREEWRITING

Get some kind of timer and set it for five minutes

7 This is so you don’t have to keep checking on how many minutesyou’ve done.

1

Write the main words of the topic at the top of thepage

7 Keep writing without stopping.7 If you can’t think of anything else to write and you want to stop, don’t.

2

What if I really can’t keep going?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I trying to plan in advance what I’ll say? (Solution: let each word suggest the next one—just go forward one

word at a time.)

7 Am I worried about writing something silly?(Solution: write something really silly, then you can stop worrying about

it. Try: ‘I can’t think of anything to write. This is ridiculous. This is the

silliest thing I’ve ever done’, etc. Eventually your brain will get bored

with that and come up with something else.)

7 Am I worrying about spelling and using the proper words?(Solution: relax, you’re going to fix all that in Step Six.)

7 Do I keep wanting to stop and read what I’ve written?(Solution: promise yourself you can do that…but not till the timer goes

off.)

3

Keep the penmoving acrossthe paper nomatter whatcomes out.

Relax . . . thisisn’t the essay,it’s justwarming up.

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7 Am I going round in circles saying the same thing over and over?(Solution: take a fresh page and give yourself a run-up with one of

these writing starters:

‘The thing about [key word] is…’

‘I don’t know much about [key word] but I do know that…’

‘This isn’t really relevant, but the thing that comes to mind about

[key word] is…’)

Think automatic writing

It’s a Zen kind of thing—just let whatever comes, come.

4

RecapFrom having only a blank page and no

ideas, you’ve now got plenty of ideas,

and plenty of words on paper. The next

step is to choose which of those words

might be useful for your piece of writing.

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STEP TWO

Choosing


Image Not Available

What’s in STEP TWOAbout choosing ideas 49

Choosing ideas for imaginative writing 50Example: Choosing ideas for imaginative writing 51

Doing it: Choosing ideas for imaginative writing 55

Choosing ideas for an essay 57Example: Choosing ideas for an essay 58

Doing it: Choosing ideas for an essay 64


About choosing ideasThis step is about having a look at all the ideas we’ve got

and assessing them. This is where we start to discriminatebetween the ideas we definitely can’t use, and ones thathave some potential. To do that, we need to remind

ourselves what our writing job is trying to do.The purpose of imaginative writing, you’ll remember, is to

‘entertain’, so for choosing an idea the test will be: can the idea bemade ‘entertaining’? The answer will be yes if the idea couldengage a reader’s feelings, let the reader see or hear something, ormake a reader want to know what happened next.

The purpose of an essay is to persuade or inform or both, sothe test we’ll use will be: can this idea be used as part of anargument, or as information about the topic? The answer will beyes if the idea would give the reader facts about the subject, ageneral concept about it, or an opinion about it, or if the idea couldbe used as supporting material or evidence.

Once you’ve chosen the ideas you think you can use, twothings will happen:

7 You’ll get a sense of the shape your piece might take—whatit could be about.

7 You’ll see where there are gaps—where you need to think upa few more ideas.

You might be thinking: ‘Why didn’t we just gather useful ideas inthe first place?’ The reason is that useful ideas and useless ideasoften come together in the same bundle. If you never let the uselessideas in, you’ll miss some of the useful ones too.

The next section is about imaginative writing.

If you want to go on with essay writing, skip ahead to page 57.

49A B O U T C H O O S I N G I D E A S

Choosing :auditioningyour ideas,finding thestars.

To end upwith ten goodideas, you needto start withtwentyordinary ones.


S T E P T WO : C H O O S I N G50

Choosing ideas for imaginative writingImaginative writing has to entertain your readers. That

means it’s got to engage their feelings—sadness orexcitement or amusement. It can also mean you arousetheir desire to know what happens next—they’re caught

up in a story or plot. Imaginative writing can’t happen in avacuum—it has to happen in a specific place to specific

characters. Descriptions of any of these will be part of whatmakes the piece entertain the reader.

For imaginative writing, we can apply the following three tests toour ideas: the feeling test, the story test, and the description test.

1. The feeling test

7 Could I use this idea to get the reader’s feelings involved tomake them amused, frightened, angry, or pleased?

7 Could I use this idea to help the reader identify with thisand recognise feelings from their own experience—makethem think: ‘Oh yes, I’ve felt that’?

2. The story test

7 Could I use this idea as part of an ongoing story?7 Can I think of something that happened just before it or

something that happened just after it?7 Is it about an actual incident at a particular moment in time

(rather than things in general)?7 Could I use it to make a reader ask: ‘What happened next’?

3. The description test

7 Could I use this idea as the description of a person, place orthing in the story (a place where a story might happen, aperson it might happen to, or a thing that could besignificant)?

7 Could I use it to create a mood or atmosphere?7 Could I use it to help a reader actually see what’s happening?

There’s adifference

between writingabout feelings

and actuallycreating

feelings inreaders. You canuse a word like

‘embarrassing’about a

feeling, but itwon’t makethe feeling

happen in areader.

Any event canbe part of a

story.

If you candraw a pictureof it, it passes

the test.

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51E X A M P L E : C H O O S I N G I D E A S F O R I M A G I N AT I V E W R I T I N G

Choosing ideas for imaginative writingChoosing from the list

In Step One I said that my imaginative writing assignment is: Write a piece

with the title ‘Steep Learning Curve’. Here’s the list I made in Step One. I’ll

go through and see which ideas pass one of the three tests.

Learning to readLearning to tell the timeLearning to swimThe Olympic Pool

D Blue waterD Little white hexagonal tilesS Dad holding me under the chestF Don’t let go, don’t let goD Funny echoing noisesF Feeling of water up nose

Learning tennisS Hitting balls over fenceS Huge swing, then missF Jeff Jackson laughing at me

Learning French at schoolS Learning lists of words by heartF Embarrassing trying to say the words out loudS Other kids seemed to be getting it okayS Me the only dummie

S = Passesstory test

F = Passesfeeling test

D = Passesdescription

test

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Teacher’s big clear writing

Flashcards in kindy

‘Kooka’ on the oven door

Learning to read

Learning to swim

Failing tests

Ran over dog

Panicked

Cheating from Caroline B

Learning to driveLearning French

Quiet back lanesuddenly full of cars

Miss M trying to look French

Jerky starts

Singing ‘Frère Jacques’

Driving test

LEARNING


Choosing from the cluster diagram

Here’s my cluster diagram from Step One.

F = Passesfeeling test

S = Passesstory test

D = Passesdescription

test

D

S

S

D

D

S

F

F

S

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All French nouns (persons orthings) are considered eithermasculine or feminine, thenoun markers le and la (oftenreferred to as definite articles)indicating the category in adistinction usually known asgender, while the plural ofboth le and la is les.

53E X A M P L E : C H O O S I N G I D E A S F O R I M A G I N AT I V E W R I T I N G

Choosing from research

First, here is my idea-getting research from Step One, and the notes I

did from it.

A rat will not normally respondto the turning-on of a light. Itdoes, however, respond to anelectric shock applied to its feet.It responds in a great many ways:by squealing, jumping, gnawing,urinating, defecating, changingrespiration rate and heart rate,and so on. If a light is turned onjust before the application of ashock to the rat, the light alone,after a number of pairings, willelicit some of the responses.

Learning French as bad as electric shocks.Learned to dread Wednesdays and Fridays—French days.Tried to be invisible, avoid teacher’s eye.

Passes feelingtest (makes mefeel sorry for

the rats)

Passes storytest

DoesnÕt passdescription test

Passes feeling test(makes me remember

the feeling)

This was my idea-developing research.

DoesnÕt passdescription test

DoesnÕt passstory test

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Learning—hard and embarrassing, you can’t do it, you feelstupid. Worse with people who already know how to do it. Nowwhat? I can’t think of anything else to write. I don’t thinkthis is working French was the worst, it didn’t make sense.Maison meant house, I could learn that, a bit like mansion.But what about the ‘le’ and ‘la’ business? How were yousupposed to remember that—two different words for ‘the’?Why? Why some ‘feminine’ and some ‘masculine’? I asked MissM—Why is ‘leg’ feminine and ‘foot’ masculine. She gave methat ‘what a dummie’ look. The whole class staring at me. NowI’ve run out of things to I cheated. Copied from Caroline Bnext to me. She tried to stop me—sloped her page away andhid it behind her hand. Maybe I really wanted to be foundcheating, so someone would rescue me.


From having nothing to write about and no ideas at the start of Step

One, I’ve now got too many ideas for one piece. I could write a piece

about learning French, about swimming, about tennis, about learning to

drive or learning to read . . .which should I use for my imaginative writing

piece?

I’ll make that decision in Step Three, when I’m putting these ideas into

an outline. First, you try choosing.

Choosing from freewriting

Here’s the freewriting I did in Step One.

Passesfeeling test

Passes storytest

Passesfeeling test

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55D O I N G I T : C H O O S I N G I D E A S F O R I M AG I N AT I V E W R I T I N G

Choosing ideas for imaginative writingFROM THE L IST YOU MADE IN STEP ONE

Hint . . . wouldmost peoplethink, ÔOh yes,IÕve felt thatÕ?

Apply the feeling test to it

Ask yourself:

7 Is this about a feeling?7 Does it make me feel a feeling?7 Would others be likely to recognise this feeling?

If the answer to any of these is yes, choose it. (Use a highlighter or just

draw a circle around it.)

1

Apply the story test to it

Ask yourself:

7 Could I use this as part of a story?7 Could I think of what might have gone before it or what might happen

after it?

7 Is this about an actual incident involving a particular person, at aparticular time, in a particular place?

7 Could this start: ‘One day…’?7 Could I use this to make a reader think: ‘And what happened after

that’?

If the answer to any of these is yes, choose it.

2

Hint . . . goodstories can growfrom tinyunimpressiveseeds.

Apply the description test to it

Ask yourself:

7 Could this describe a place in my piece of writing?7 Could this describe a person?7 Could this describe an object?7 Does this help a reader see or hear?7 Could this help to create a mood or atmosphere?

If the answer to any of these is yes, choose it.

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What you have now is a collection of ideas with potential to be used in your

piece.

The next section is about essay writing. If you want to go on

with imaginative writing, skip ahead to Step Three (page 67).

What if this isn’t working?

Ask yourself:

7 Am I setting my standards for choosing unrealistically high?(Solution: lower them—just to get yourself started—even Shakespeare

had to start somewhere.)

7 Am I trying to find things that could be used just as they are?(Solution: recognise that these early ideas might have to be changed

before you can use them.)

7 Am I disappointed not to be choosing more ideas?(Solution: even if you only choose a couple of ideas from your list

that’s okay. You can build on them.)

4

Repeat this process with the other things you did inStep One

7 the cluster diagram;7 the research;7 the freewriting.

5

Relax . . . youÕreauditioning forpotential here,not a polishedperformance.

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Choosing ideas for an essayThe purpose of an essay, you’ll remember, is to persuade orinform or both. That means engaging the readers’ thoughtsrather than their feelings.

They might get some information from your essay orthey might see information arranged to illustrate a general

concept. Or they might be persuaded of a particular point of viewabout the topic. In this case the point of view will be supported byexamples and other kinds of evidence.

For an essay, then, we’ll apply the following three basic tests to allour ideas:

1. The information test

7 Does this idea provide any facts about the subject (for example,a definition, a date, a statistic or background information)?

2. The concept test

7 Could I use this to put forward a general concept about asubject (an opinion, a general truth or a summary)?

7 Could I use this as part of a theory or an opinion about thesubject (either my own or someone else’s)?

3. The evidence test

7 Could I use this to support any information I present?7 Could I use this to support an opinion (point of view) or

theory about the subject?7 Is it a concrete example of the idea I’m putting forward?7 Is it a quote from an authority on the subject, or some other

kind of supporting material?

At this stage you probably don’t know exactly what arguments orpoints your essay is going to make. That’s okay, you don’t have toknow that yet. Going through the ideas you have and applying thesetests will help you clarify that.

Now, I’m going to go through all the bits I wrote in Step One andchoose anything that will pass any of these three tests.

57C H O O S I N G I D E A S F O R A N E S S AY

A good essayneeds all threeof these.

Chicken andegg again . . . letthe ideascome first andsuggest thetheme.

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‘A novel I’ve read this year’What have I read?Tomorrow, When the War BeganLooking for AlibrandiHuckleberry FinnThe Day of the Triffids

‘Self-discovery’What exactly is self-discovery?How define?Discovering you can do something?Learning how to do something?Learning from mistakes?Learning about your own character?

Choosing ideas for an essayChoosing from my list

First, I’ll remind myself of what my topic is: ‘Every story is a journey towards

self-discovery.’ Using a novel you’ve read this year as an example, show why you

agree or disagree with this statement.

Here’s the list I made in Step One. I’ll go through and see which ideas

pass any of the tests for an essay.


Passes information test(or it will, when I have

this information)

DoesnÕt passconcept test

Passes evidence test(when IÕve chosen one)

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Implies you didn’t know before

Things you thinkyou can’t do

Needs things to go wrong

Needs a crisis?Learning about yourself

Discover good things

Might notwant to know Kind, wise, brave . . .

mature

Discover bad things

SELF-DISCOVERY

SelfishCowardly

Hurt others

Choosing from the cluster diagram

Here’s my cluster diagram from Step One.

59E X A M P L E : C H O O S I N G I D E A S F O R A N E S S AY

DoesnÕt passinformation test

DoesnÕt passevidence test

Passesconcept

test

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—Ellie explodes mower—learns about defending herself82—steps into light—learns she can be brave95—thinks about having kil

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